After my failed qualification attempt last month, I told myself that I would try again later in the month or February, but now God forbids me to do so. Since that week the weather has been consistently warm again that we now have returned to 16-24°C air temperature and 18-19°C sea temperature now. I have already found some people outside Hong Kong who are willing to take my September slot in case I decide to give up my Channel swim….
As my Channel training in the past year went wrong in every possible aspect, the problem of not being able to get back to the right track has already made me too stressed that it’s affecting my health. After visiting a psychologist last week, I have decided to suspend my Channel training, and try to find a friend who’s willing to take my spot in case if I finally decide not to do it this year. My former Total Immersion…
It’s now January 2021 and my Channel training hasn’t gone back to the right track yet. Everything is still wrong. Today I have come closer to giving up. Last month, December 2020, I tried to ramp up my training from 18 km / week before my head injury to 28 km / week in Christmas period. I got too tired and had to reduce to 20 km / week in the first week of January, and this week I should…
In the past 10 months, my training went completely wrong. I could not do my desired training from February to September. I could only get back since October. Despite that, I didn’t believe my situation to be bad enough to give it up outright, so I tried to adjust my second training block (November to April) to compensate for my missing training previously. In my original plan, I would do a 30 km rehearsal swim in February, or alternatively my…
Continued from the first half of the year. July 2020 I didn’t continue the training in the swim clubs. Instead, I was waiting for my coach, Chung Ho, to resume teaching when the situation of COVID-19 improved. My swimming was at an all-time low since I started in 2018, normally only getting in the water 2 times per week, less than an hour each time, as everything including the pools and the ocean were too hot for me. Then, in…
Now, a lot of people already know that I’m going to swim the Channel in September 2021, so it’s time for me to share my training progress. The beginning At the end of 2018, the idea of swimming the Channel during a working holiday in 2021 appeared in my mind. It would be a fun and extraordinary thing for me to do, to make my working holiday special and unregrettable. Morever, at that time, there weren’t any Hongkongers who had…
I did DWB TT, my first swimming race today since the COVID pandemic began in February. It is a race using interval start that drafting is not allowed. The actual course length was 2.67 km and I completed in 0:57:39, 62nd place out of 111 completed participants. By cross-comparing the results of MMIC last year (there are 23 participants who did both), I remained at the same level. My original training plan before the pandemic was to do technique and…
On 12 August, Isaac Yuen did an experimental swim near his home observed by me, which became the inaugural MSF documented swim (currently pending ratification) in Hong Kong. The swim itself is only a small challenge, especially for an experienced ultra-endurance athlete which has done more than 50 marathons / ultra-marathons / trail running races. What’s valuable is that by doing this swim, we have got a lot of experience in swim planning, crewing, observing, etc. according to the internationally-recognised…
Within a week, 4 Hongkongers made history in the English Channel as the first ever solo Hongkonger and the first ever Hong Kong relay team to swim across it. The solo crossing was done by Chun Kong Mak. He lives in Czechia currently. He is a seasoned marathon swimmer and ice swimmer. Last year he also became the first ever Hongkonger to complete an ice mile. He started at 23:39 1st September and got it across in 13 hours and…
Hongkongers are going to make history in the English Channel soon. In a few days’ time, there will be a solo and a relay team attempting to swim the 33-km crossing from England to France. Chun Kong Mak will likely depart tomorrow on a spring tide, weather permitting. He will attempt to become the first Hongkonger to swim the English Channel solo. He is a very accomplished open water swimmer. He raced a lot of marathon swimming races in Czechia….